My Doodlebugs don't need to have a knowledge of abstract art or the use of colour in art to express emotion... at this age they simply know what they like and I haven't come across a child yet who isn't happy recreating Kandinsky's concentric circles :)

Firstly, cutting a circle at the age of 5 can be a hard task. Secondly, piecing together a whole work of art from several smaller parts is a skill that is only just developing at this age. The Doodlebugs need practice recognizing what goes where and in this sense a collage is just like building a puzzle!

All in all a very cute project packed with lots of skill-building value.

Today the Picassos took a look at the concept of perspective. It's not the first time we've touched on this art concept. Whenever I get the opportunity to point out how something looks different because of the angle or where it is in the picture I tend to focus on that and I use the word 'perspective' over and over again. That's not by accident :)

But today we're going to really zero in on how things look from far away and close up... the perspective could change the size, the level of detail you notice, even the colour your eyes see! To do this we're painting a beautiful scene from around the Savannah!

This is a two part lesson but take a look at what they've done so far :)

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The Picassos finished their watercolour President's Houses and I have to say they took great pride in the process. I was happy to hear questions throughout like "should I use the wet-on-wet technique for the sky?" and "hmm... how would I get a creamy colour for the walls?"... experiment my little Picassos experiment. And that's just what they did!

My Thursday afternoon Picassos finished their President's House paintings today! They really took their time and they buddied up to mix different tints and shades of green :)

For Republic Day we talked about our national emblems, our national birds, flowers and instruments! I am pleased to say all of my little ones were able to name a lot of them :) Then we got down to painting the gorgeous Scarlet Ibis!

I prepared a basic Ibis template for them so they all had the same size bird and they had to add in the feet, beak etc and of course we drew in the swampy background. Then came the moment they all wait for in every art class... when we crack open the paint tubs and they get to dig in!

The Doodlebugs drew and painted an under water seascape today! They got to put in whatever they could think of that would belong under water today and boy were they happy about that :) They looked at the little video to get some ideas and also to expand their view of what fish can look like and then talked about what they would put in their picture.

The shapes of some of these fish are just wondrous... lol and I just let them have fun because let's face it there are some pretty funky looking fish out there anyway!

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I personally love to paint buildings (especially old houses and buildings with lots of character), so in honour of Republic Day we're turning our attention to President's House.

Of course we touched on what it means to be a republic and why this is different from being independent. A lot of my Picassos got the connection between becoming a republic state and the significance of the President as our Head of State instead of the Queen and they were very happy to show off their knowledge from school today at art class :)

So anyway... onto our art for today! They followed a directed line drawing of President's House (after looking at pictures of the real thing). I banned rulers today... I wanted the drawing to be free flowing and loose and didn't want them to get too caught up in struggling with lines, and of course developing those fine motor skills and steadying the hand is a nifty side-effect of that. They were also forced to focus on scale and proportion today.
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​ Next week we'll paint and really bring this piece to life!

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From the moment I first came across this little book I knew I had to read it to my Picassos and paint that silly (sorry Petunia) goose.

You see, Petunia has a bit of a hang up about being called a silly goose, so when she came across a book in the field, she decided to take it everywhere so people would think she was wise. The plan worked and the barnyard animals all looked to Petunia for advice because of her new wise personna... and well you can guess what happens. I just think this is such a neat little moral, especially at the start of the school term, and it's told in an engaging and funny way! Take a look at the video up above to see what I mean!

We painted the cover picture for this lovely little story by first sketching our goose and painting the background with the details first. Since the goose is mostly white, she was left blank and the details were put in at the very end with black paint. I also challenged some of my Picassos to add a few details to Petunia to bring out her personality in the picture.

Take a look at our results!

Thursday Picassos met Petunia today :) Take a look at some of our newly minted Picassos and some of our 'old hats' ;P